15 Battle in the Soul World

Imagine developing an ability that allows you to materialize whatever you can think of. Most people would start to experiment a bit by creating small objects, and slowly increase them in size in order to completely master the ability. Once that 's done, you would probably be able to create a lot of varied stuff, your mind being the only limit. Now imagine someone just creating the same object over and over. That's so disappointing! What a waste! Now consider the following: with all the heads the hydra was creating, it should have more and more brain for each head. Therefore, why did it never realize how dumb that plan was?

That is exactly what went through Joshua's mind as he saw the hydra just mass producing its dumb head. He was tired to see it by now. One tried to take a bite at their boat, it was no problem to avoid with the speed of the motor. He shook his head and looked at Catherine.

"I will take care of that dumb snake, just focus on the old man," he said smirking.

Before Catherine could reply, he suddenly hugged her and whispered in her ear: "Surprise!"

Suddenly they were both ejected in the air. The motorboat might be fast, but Joshua never considered fighting the snake while still at sea, it would give the beast too much of an advantage. Therefore, when he had created the boat, he had included a giant spring that would activate on command, propulsing all the passengers a few meters in the air. The idea was utterly absurd and therefore, fitted Joshua to at.

As Catherine yelled in surprise, Joshua dismissed the boat, it was no longer useful. Instead, he materialized what he really wanted to use to move quickly, a jet plane. As they landed in the cockpit, he gently let go of Catherine.

"We're changing vehicles, this one will be much faster," he said, sitting down on the pilot's seat. Of course, Luna was piloting, Joshua had no idea how to control a plane. Catherine sat next to him and he helped her buckle her seat belt, as she was unfamiliar with the concept of it. Catherine had been taken aback from what just happened and had just watched the situation unfold with her mouth open. As Joshua fastened her belt, she finally found her senses again. She saw the unfamiliar vehicle they were in right now, move at extremely high speed, avoiding the hydra without any issue. Also, they were flying, the hydra had no way to catch them. She was relieved, but at the same time, she couldn't help but be a little mad.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU INFORM ME ABOUT THIS BEFOREHAND?" she yelled. "Seriously, it's good you had a plan to avoid the Hydra, but you could at least warn me when we're projected in the air. At least I could have been prepared in case of an emergency."

"... Whoops. Sorry, that's actually a good point." he had to admit.

"Yes, madam!" he replied and sent instructions to Luna. The plane suddenly fired missiles at a few heads, which exploded on impact, instantly destroying the heads.

"Ha, turns out the snakes aren't very solid, no wonder this machine has gear made of metal after all." he thought, high fiving his brain.

Of course, this victory was short lived as more snakes replaced the ones that got destroyed. Joshua considered trying to make a weapon of mass destruction but dropped the idea. It would be too dangerous for Catherine & him and besides, he didn't want to destroy the old man's soul world. Instead, he flew over to what appeared to be the main body, where the old man was trapped in and shot a missile at it. It landed on the lump of flesh but healed nearly instantly. Clearly, this one was much more solid. However, while the wound was still open, he did notice something shine from inside the creature. Confident, he unleashed a few shots, making sure to avoid the old man. As the hydra's flesh was exposed, he did a quick scan regarding the shining parts. It turned out the hydra had some rune inside its body!

Some parts of the rune were unknown to him. He had seen runes on physical bodies before, but this was the first time he saw one engraved in a soul. Still, he could recognize some patterns and could deduce that rune was at the core of the hydra's ability to multiply. That gave him an idea.

"If I get you to the old man, how quickly can you help him?" he asked.

"I think ten seconds should be enough."

"Good, I'm going to buy you that. Be warned, we're gonna fly again."

"...OK," she answered, a bit worried.

Joshua grinned and put his plan into motion. He ordered Luna to get closer. Once they were right above the head, the plane started to dash downward. Joshua unleashed a new salve of missiles and ejected them out of the plane. Like before, he was holding on to Catherine, it was vital they didn't get separated.

As they were freefalling, Joshua deployed a parachute and their fall was slowed down. He smiled when the missiles hit the hydra again, exposing the rune. His smile turned into a big grin when the plane crashed right where the hydra's wound was located, causing an even bigger explosion. He rejoiced as he saw that one by one, the other snakeheads vanished. The rune had been damaged, interrupting the hydra's ability to multiply, and while it could regenerate, Joshua knew that recreating a rune mentally was difficult, well except if you had an AI assist you. Therefore, they had an opening to free the old man's soul.

Catherine saw the succession of explosions, succeeded by the various heads vanishing. She was unsure what that madman had done this time, but she wouldn't waste the opportunity he had given her. They landed a few seconds later, the lump of flesh was heavily injured but was already starting to recover, she had to act quickly.

First, she created a blade out of ice and cut deeply into the flesh mound. She quickly cut out a portion, separating the old man's body from the rest of the beast. However, that wouldn't suffice, the flesh she had cut was somewhat linked to the beast and would be reabsorbed by it soon, old man included. Of course, she was a summoner, she had ways to deal with bad spirits. She laid her hands on the old man's face and focused.

Joshua was slowing down the regeneration by regularly throwing bombs in the wound. However, when Catherine started her 'exorcism' he looked with attention. He watched as the lump of flesh she had cut out slowly melted away from the old man. When that was done, the old man's body suddenly started to tremble, before letting out a big breath, like someone who had just been underwater for a while.

She did not stop there, though. The hydra was still present, she had to break the link. This time she put her hands on the massive lump of flesh and focused again. A mighty blue aura surrounded her this time, she was clearly giving her all. As usual, Joshua was observing the process and recording it. There was something uncanny about how she had freed the old man, and something similar was happening here. Catherine had referred to those as 'skills of a summoner' but they differed greatly from the magic he had been learning so far.

In the real world, the group saw that the ice coffin surrounding the old man was starting to crack in several places and melting in others. The man would soon be free. Seeing this, Eric unleashed some fire to help the process.

As Catherine finished her spell, the large mound of flesh started to break apart. Joshua quickly made his boat appear again and put the old man in there before jumping on it with Catherine. They took a deep breath as they watched the body of the hydra vanish from a safe distance.

"What did you do exactly?" Joshua asked.

"I banished it," she answered.

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"How exactly? Doesn't look like magic I'm familiar with."

"It's summoner magic, it's an ability we are born with."

"Hmm… Can you tell me more details later?"

Catherine nodded with a faint smile.

"I'm not sure what all those machines were, but you did well. Can you show me more how those work? It might be useful in the future."

"Trade of information, huh? Sure! Humans grow by learning new stuff. It will be good for both of us."

After saying this, he gave Catherine a hug and kissed her cheek. It was hard for him to quantify how much he adored that girl. Thanks to her, he saw new things every day and hey, he just fought a hydra. Maybe someday he'll get his own legend like Hercules.